Steve McClaren: I don’t know how long I’ve got to save my job at Newcastle

Miles Starforth

Steve McClaren says he does not know how long he will get to turn Newcastle United around.

McClaren is the bookmakers’ favourite to be the Premier League casualty.

You go into every job knowing the impatience of football and you need results. We know what the situation is, and it’s game to game. We’re fighting for the next result.

Steve McClaren

Newcastle are second-bottom of the division ahead of Sunday’s home game against in-form Liverpool.

And McClaren, appointed as head coach in the summer with a brief to guide the team to a top-eight finish, admitted after last weekend’s 5-1 drubbing at Crystal Palace that the club was in a “relegation battle”.

The 54-year-old is safe in his post – for now.

But if the team’s form fails to improve this month, the club could make a change.

United’s hierarchy stuck with Alan Pardew, his predecessor, but McClaren feels only results will keep him in his job.

Asked about his future, he said: “It’s football, so you never know.

“You go into every job knowing the impatience of football and you need results. We know what the situation is, and it’s game to game. We’re fighting for the next result.”

Asked if he had sought reassurances about his position, McClaren said: “I wouldn’t ask for that and I wouldn’t expect to receive that.

“I think that’s demonstrated by what we do during the week and what we do on a Saturday or Sunday, and that’s why it’s important.

McClaren had a “routine” meeting with managing director Lee Charnley this week.

He said: “It was a normal, routine weekly meeting that we have to catch up. It was a chat.”

McClaren refused to say how many games he expected to get in a new job to prove he was right for the post.

“I’m still here, so I don’t think that’s a question I can answer,” he said.

“I’m here, doing a job and that’s it. We’ve got a game on Sunday and I’m not thinking ‘phew, I need this or I need that’.

“I know what the process is, and I know what the job is. We know what needs doing.

“Will we be given time? We need to get results to keep that going, we know that, but like everything, we do the right things every day, we do the work and we try and give the players the confidence they need on a Saturday, Sunday, whenever to win games.”